The Laker Player:

Wilt Chamberlain arrived to the Lakers for the 1968-69 season and spent the last 5 years of his career at L.A.

Despite not being the unstoppable force he was in his youth years, when he could score at will (he averaged 50.4 points in 1961-62), Chamberlain was an evolved player that had led the league with 8.6 assists the previous year.

He averaged 17.7 points for the Lakers, almost half of his 30.1 career average (second-best only to Michael Jordan), but he did it with an incredible effectiveness from the field with a .605 over the 5 season and an astronomic .727 field goal percentage at 36 years old in 1972-73 (NBA record for players with more than 20 games in a season). He still dominated the boards with 19.2 rebounds (led the NBA in 1969, '71, '72 and '73) and had become a team player that could add 4.3 assists. Chamberlain also returned to an All-NBA team in 1972 and was selected for the only 2 All-defensive First Teams of his career.

Lakers Career Stats

Season

Playoffs

Points

17.7

15.8

Rebounds

19.2

22.3

Assists

4.3

3.6

FG%

.605

.531

The Unstoppable Team:

Ironically enough, the most dominant basketball player of all times averaged "just" 14.8 points, the second lowest of his career, to be part of the most dominant basketball team ever: the 1971-72 Lakers.

The team that included Jerry West , Gail Goodrich, Jim McMillan and Happy Hairston among others, won 33 games in a row, a record still unbroken more than 35 years later, and had a then unprecedented 69-13 record. To the moment only the 1996 Bulls could do better.

The Lakers couldn't be stopped in the Playoffs either and won the NBA Championship with a 12-3 record, including the 4-1 Finals against the Knicks. Wilt Chamberlain was selected the Finals MVP and the Lakers ended an incredible bad-streak of 8 finals lost.

When he retired from the NBA in 1973, he was league top scorer with 31,419 points (later surpassed by Abdul-Jabbar, Jordan and Malone) and was the owner of uncountable records. Many of them are still current, including most of his rebound records and of course his legendary 100 points and 55 rebounds in single games. He scored 50 points or more on 118 separate occasions, including 60 or more an out-of-this-world 32 times.

Chamberlain never "fouled out" in 1045 regular season games. His legacy also includes being responsible for several rule changes and one of the greatest NBA rivalries of all time: Wilt Chamberlain vs. Bill Russell.

Wilt Chamberlain Career Highlights

* 100 points * Wilt Chamberlain is the only player in NBA history to have scored 100 points in a game. Some say it was another time with other kind of player and style of game, but have you heard of another player from those days that got closer to that? The second in the list is Kobe Bryant with 81, 19 points below Chamberlain's mark, and that was in 2006.

* 55 rebounds *
This stat is not so famous as his 100 points but it is equally amazing.

* Basketball Hall of Fame *
Wilt Chamberlain was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1978.

* 50.4 points and 25.7 rebounds* That was Chamberlain's averages in 1961-62, his third NBA year. These days 30 points or 13 rebounds are enough to lead the NBA.

* A complete Player *
Wilt Chamberlain was a scoring machine and the owner of the boards but that wasn't enough to win a championship. In 1966-67, Sixers Coach Alex Hannum asked him to pass the ball more and to play more aggressive defense. The versatile Chamberlain didn't won the scoring title for the first time in his career, averaging 24.1 points(from 33.5 the previous season), but he recorded the league's highest shooting percentage (.683), had the most rebounds (24.2 rpg), was third in assists (7.8 apg) and won his 3rd season MVP. The next year he even led the league in assists with 8.6 per game, becoming the only player in NBA history to have led the league in the almost incompatible combination of categories of points, rebounds and assists.